Suburban Home Improvement

Have used Suburban Home Improvement every time I needed replacement of windows doors siding in the last 14 years and most recently the roof this year. It was a great experience from working with the owners to the installation crew. Never had any issues throughout the process. Would definitely recommend for any home improvement work.

Perfect from sales appointment to completion of projects. Fair price, quality products, and professional crew, made sure yard was free from any and all debris each day they were there as well. We are completely satisfied

The same guy always comes out and he does a really nice. He calls a few days before the scheduled appointment.

Don from Suburban Home Imp. comes across as a trustworthy person, however no so much. I was told I would receive a 20yr warranty on new gutters & downspouts installed by his subcontractor (Alside). It has been almost 8 months and I still do not have it. Numerous calls & emails have been ignored which were sent to Don and Alside. If they did respond nothing came of it. Always some delay tactic to hold me off. They made a promise to supply the 20yr warranty so I would pay them, which appears they never meant to keep. They had to rehang the downspouts because they were installed 6" out from the house. Second hanging is about 3". Don told me, after winter if I am not happy he would have them rehung for a 3rd time. Like that would happen when he does not call me, email was returned undeliverable and no warranty provided. I could say alot more but the point is do not trust Don of Suburban Home Improvement and Alside. GET EVERTHING IN WRITING and don't pay until you are completely satisfied.

I still got the windows, and they work fine. I have no complaints at all. It was a good experience, I had no problems with them at all. They're a good company to do business with.

The Siding and Gutter on my house looks very nice!! Also the Crew did a wonderful job!! I would give them a (A+)

The work performed was excellent, with exceptional fit and finish. The cost was reasonable, and each element of the product was thoroughly explained by Don, with his providing professional insight that was spot on.

Great experience. Don responded to our estimate request promptly. He was very knowledgeable and professional. His work crew was experienced, polite, quiet. They showed up on time and cleaned up each day. The job took a week. We are pleased with the results and would hire Suburban again.

Did a good job on the first project.  Had Don come out for a second project.  He reviewed it and said he would call me with the estimate.  He never called back.  I left 6 messages for him and he never returned my call.  This second job I had was probably a lot less expensive than the first.  So perhaps he just wasn't interested.  But he should have called back.  Very unprofessional.

It went very well! The three men who installed the windows worked tirelessly for two days, even though the weather was cold and snowy. The windows are perfect, and the house is much warmer and quieter now too. Good quality product and installation.

Workers were prompt.Work was done well. Owner inspected the work and made necessary corrections.

Service was great !! Don was an excellent salesman and the installers were efficient .  Installers cleaned up after themselves and were courteous !!  Great Company !!

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The installation went well.  It took two days to install 16 windows.  The only problem was with four of the large windows we ordered swing in sections that were not delivered.  The contractor was willing to replace these windows but we decided to opt for a reduction in the cost.  The approximate savings was the cost of one of the larger windows.
The windows have been in for a year and are performing very will.

The job was supposed to last 2 days.  It started a day late which wasn't a problem at all.  The team came in and had the old roof removed and the new one installed in one day since the weather report called for rain the following day.  They worked like horses, only took one break and were very professional. The new roof was completed and cleanup of the property was finished by 6PM that evening.  These guys were super nice and courteous.  If I had to do it all over again, they would be my first call.  Thanks Suburban.

Suburban was extremely responsive in all inquiries.  The work was done to a high standard and we are happy with the results.  Don is very communicative and upfront about the breakdown of charges on the estimate.  The project manager on site was friendly, knowledgeable, and had good solutions to the issues on our house.
Cons: the work took a lot longer than original estimation.  However, we don't care because we want it done correctly.  It also fell over the Labor Day Weekend which had some effect.  Workers were often done by 2:00, but the weather was unusually hot so we understand- they arrived at 8:00.  Original estimate was 2 days of work, but they were on site for a week and a half.
Pros: Estimate/quote was actual price in the end.  Quote was competitive and work was quality.  Workers were respectful of our property.  Payment terms were 100% upon completion. Don and Deb were very responsive for all inquiries and concerns. 
We got exactly what we expected from the estimate and will definitely use them again.  We will be calling them to bid for work when we upgrade our roof and siding.  If you are not on an accelerated or detailed timeline, they are a perfect choice.  I would substitute my project's timeline a little for a quality job at a good price. 

Excellent

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I've been putting off writing this review for a long time because I've been really uncertain of what to say exactly. My interaction with Suburban started off so well that it's been hard to believe it ended so poorly. We contracted with Suburban to have the roof on our house and the flat roof on our garage replaced. Because the box gutters and capping weren't looking great, I also requested that those be realigned, secured, and/or replaced where needed.
Suburban's Don Poehlig came out to give me the estimate, and it seemed like he was very thorough. He also wasn't pushy, which I appreciated. We agreed that the work would start sometime around May of 2012. As agreed upon, the workers showed up around that time and did the main roof tear-off, the replacement, and even installed a solar air vent that I had requested. They also did the work on the flat garage roof. The workers were friendly and did a pretty good job of picking up after themselves.  I was suitably impressed by their professionalism at this point.  When Don came to pick up the check, I asked if they were going to take care of the box gutter/capping work. Don realized that had been forgotten. Since most of the work had been done and what was left was fairly insignificant, I offered to still pay them even with the remaining items outstanding. Don thanked me and assured me someone would be out in the next week or so. In retrospect, that was a big mistake.
Two weeks later, I called to see when someone was going to come out. We played voicemail tag for several weeks, it seemed, and finally got a date for someone to come. We arrived home that evening to find the work still undone. I waited a couple more days to see if perhaps we'd just gotten bumped back a day or two due to weather or something before resuming phone tag. I
finally connected with Don after more phone tag, and he informed me that there had been a bees' nest inside the gutters that prevented them from finishing the work. I completely understand that being a legitimate reason to not finish the work, but I wish they had called to let me know rather than waiting for me to hunt them down. Don offered to have someone come out in the fall to finish the work after the bees were dormant.
Fall arrived, and I (unwisely) waited to see if Suburban would pre-emptively finish the work. In November, I called them to ask if they would complete the work. Don came out to see what work I was referring to. As I showed him the box gutter and capping work, he told me that they were just ?doing me a favor? by taking care of that work. I pointed out that that work was actually covered in our contract (see photo: ?Installation at the discretion of the Suburban Home Improvement installer. Reseal box gutters, renail capping along top of box gutters and add material (capping) if needed.?)
In addition, since the time Suburban had finished the work, we had observed water damage on a bedroom wall reappearing where we had major issues previously. I had showed Don this water damage when he came to give me the original quote and had been reassured by him that a new roof and flashing would take care of the problem. While Don was out, we showed him that the water damage was reappearing. He told us that the damage on the bedroom wall was happening because we needed to get our chimney capped. That wasn't what we were hoping to hear because that particular water issue was 95% of the reason we'd decided to have the roof redone. Also, since replacing the roof, we had already gutted the wall and replastered and repainted over the damaged area (which was now showing water damage again). [On a side note, we asked the chimney cap contractor to look over the flashing job Suburban had done, and he needed to fix some of it.]
Within a week, someone came out to our house and finished the capping. But, when I say ?finished the capping,? essentially, it looks like they put a piece of capping where it belonged and threw a single nail in it to hold it on.  Nothing was realigned or secured otherwise.
So, at the end of the day, this is what we have to show for our work with Suburban:
The Good:
- a replacement roof, the shingles of which look nice and have stayed intact
- a solar vent correctly installed on the roof
- a garage roof that (we think) has actually stopped leaking entirely
The Bad:
- box gutters and capping that looked as bad as they did before the work started and now look even worse because the wind has torn off a huge amount of box gutter/soffit/fascia/capping because it wasn't realigned and secured like we requested (see pictures)
- a chimney cap for $700 put on by a different contractor that we are hoping has finally taken care of the water problem in the bedroom
- a wall in said bedroom that once again needs to be fixed and repainted
- a $12,500 dip in our bank account for what we paid to Suburban + the amounts we've paid for the chimney cap, the fixing of the bedroom wall a second time, and someone to do some serious work on our box gutters/soffit/fascia/capping
- hours of phone calls, hand wringing, regrets, and trying to figure out what the next course of action was each time something else cropped up
In retrospect, it seems that we could've waited to replace the main house roof. The most significant problem appears to have been solvable with a $700 chimney cap. Go figure. We had another contractor bid on the roof work before we selected Suburban. He was more expensive and his quote process/communication was a little disorganized, but in retrospect, we wish we had gone with him. Perhaps these are just the woes of old houses that contractors can't anticipate, but we feel like any contractor whose house looked like ours does after a roofing job was completed would be hopping mad.
Why am I finally writing this review now?  The box gutters/soffit/fascia/capping all coming down over the past couple months has been the straw that broke the camel's back.  We've tried to make excuses for Suburban to ourselves for the past couple years, but with our house now looking worse than it did before we had it roofed, we just couldn't excuse them in our heads anymore.  Correction - I couldn't excuse them anymore.  My husband has been trying to get me to review them since 2012, and I just couldn't bring myself to do it.  But, here we are.  Suburban was such a promising contractor - A rated on Angie's List and everything on the front end going so well.  But, the back-end has been devastatingly disastrous.

Contracted for windows/siding.
Windows done first with minimal problems.
Siding was completely installed on house when we discovered that the wrong style was used.  Contractor was notified and we were offered a price cut to keep the siding they had already installed. We declined and all of the siding had to be completely removed. After new siding arrived, the same crew who did the work the first time, returned (from Ohio where they were based) to install the correct siding. Our understanding was that the "crew of installers" was hired by the aluminum siding company and NOT from Suburban itself. Crew was sloppy--- left cigarette butts, nails, scraps of siding, everywhere.
Not a good experience.

Job went well and was completed in a timely manner  - Quality & price was excellent. Worker were professional.   I would recommend that you give them a chance to bid your job if you are doing a window or door upgrade